lewin

This is common, both inside and outside of academia. Most entities that seek applications rarely notify the people they don't select. There is a difference between grad school applications and a job application, namely, you don't pay to apply to a job, but the department doesn't get the application money although they are the one that set the timeline for decisions. i.e. I am not sure what you mean by "they just want [your] application money".
Later on, if you apply to academic jobs, you will not hear anything at all if you don't get the job. Many places wait until the hired person starts before they close the hiring file and the system generates an auto rejection message. For some of my friends, this is years after the job application. Sometimes school does this too and you get a notification when the school year begins in the fall, or over the summer when the school finally closes the previous year's system and starts up the next year. Unless you got very far in the process, you should not expect any notification at all, much less a personalized letter.
As for the content, what else is there to say other than you were not accepted. You weren't offering your application up for an evaluation and feedback. The materials submitted are solely for the school to decide if you would be a good fit, so there should be no expectation of anything other than a decision. 
Yes, it sucks to get a rejection in this way, but it is neither unprofessional nor ridiculous. I got some nicely written rejection letters as well. I don't think I felt any different about those than the ones that just updated an online portal. 

Honestly, the biggest offense in this scenario is probably the fact you have a 72-word sentence.

Sometimes it's the things you mention. But it's possible that aspects of your underlying assumption (quoted) are wrong. The people who have applied 3+ times and are still unsuccessful might not have the aptitude for graduate studies--or are consistently aiming higher than their aptitude would allow. Sometimes there are factors that more RA experience just won't fix, like hitting a ceiling on GRE scores, having an undergraduate degree from a middling institution, or unknowingly resubmitting unremarkable reference letters (in content or source). Not everybody is cut out for graduate school (or medical school, or dating a supermodel, etc.).
ETA: I am curious why it's scary that not everybody can get what they want, career wise. I absolutely understand why it might be personally uncomfortable to think that one can't have one's dream, but why in the more general sense that "people" won't be able to do it?
 

@smals hey there - most of the masters programs in the city are pretty crappy to be honest. In the highest sense, they are more like your 3rd/4th year classes of higher psych courses in undergrad, just retaught to you. When going to this Masters program you shouldnt think "oh this is a great school" because its, well, a masters in general psych and they take anywhere from 100 - 150 students a cohort. You should think more, will I use NYC to my advantage. Thats what I did when I did a masters at St. John's. Granted St. Johns, in my opinion, is a much stronger masters program because you are only 1 of maybe 15 students vs TC and NYU when you are 1 of hundreds. But I used the city to my advantage. I beacame a graduate student RA in 2 major research labs in the city and was going to school full time. It opened a lot of doors for me post graduation in getting a FT job and then eventually using all that experience to apply to clinical psych programs. TBH you're not going to come out of NYU being a much better psych major - you definitely will have more familiarity of the concepts, and definitely much more knowledge around stats... but Masters programs are meant to help you get more experience if you work for it on your own. I think maybe some of the negative feedback you're getting is because people thought they were going into a masters program thinking that this was the for sure thing they needed to get into a doctoral program and they quickly realized its just relearning a lot of the same things they learned in undergrad.
Hope this helps - one thing for sure, is NYC has a lot of research available, and they all love free labor. So if you're willing to pay for the cost of their Masters program (which is extremely expensive) and also the cost of living in NYC (which is also extremely expensive) to possibly get some more research experience, do it (I did and it worked out for me). But dont come to NYU thinking that this program is a great program because its "NYU" because again, you're going to a 2 year terminal masters program - which funds their PhD programs.

That there is NOT "no research exp". That's actually quite a lot of experience. What you're lacking are publications, but that's an entirely separate issue and not entirely up to you when you work in a lab anyway. The experience is the time you put into the lab and projects and what you learned from that. You developed skills, you refined your interests, you learned to present and write, design studies, work in a team, perform certain analyses. All of these are things that you can discuss in an SOP to make it a strong one. They should also lead to strong letters of recommendation from people who know you well. This kind of experience should give you enough insight to know what you want to study and what career path you want to pursue, and you should be able to have a strong argument for why you're qualified to do it and why the schools you're applying to are the right place(s) to pursue these interests. I'd really stop worrying about things you cannot change and focus on perfecting what already sounds like a potentially very strong application. 

I reached out to the person that signed my rejection letter for SDSU's Psychology program and got feedback. The general guideline is to do it respectfully so that they don't think you're trying to argue with their decision and they will usually get back to you within a few days. 

You have higher odds of getting hit by a meteorite. Believe me, even if that passage was terribly obvious plagiarism, professors barely have time to read papers for the first time to correct them, much to less go back and read old papers.

Sorry if I was unclear: in the role as an advocate for students through the grad student government, it was our mission to help students advocate for their needs. It was not our place to decide whether or not their needs are objectively necessary/founded/etc. To be more clear, in this role, my main advocacy was to talk to students who had an issue in order to learn about their situation and then use our knowledge of the available resources and/or the people we knew in the administration that would be sympathetic to the student's request. Or, in the above case, we might help them look up information to make their case (e.g. searching for policies at similar schools). We would pass on this information or make introductions as necessary, but ultimately the request for a special consideration was the responsibility of the individual student. Sometimes the student comes back to us with updates or shares good/bad news, so I sometimes know what happens, but sometimes not! However, in these cases, we aren't representing all graduate students and we don't directly interact with the Administration as the "Grad Student Government". We simply empower students to be their own advocates.
(Through the grad student government, we do sometimes directly interact with the Administration as the official "Government". These cases are much fewer and when we do so, there is a lot of background work like what you have listed here because now we are indeed representing the entire student body and we need to ensure we are advocating for something that is a overall good for the community and does not cause any undue hardship on any other parts of the community. As you can imagine, this things are much more slow moving and projects like this have timelines of months or even 1+ years. Sometimes they are easy to support [e.g. a campaign to increase everyone's stipends] while others require careful consideration to earn student body approval [e.g. increase health insurance coverage for certain things that greatly reduces financial burden of a few people while increasing the cost of insurance by a few dollars to everyone else]).
Yes, I was referring to Ontario. And yes, you are right that the system does set it up so that people lie. In addition, it also probably sets it up so that landlords can secretly take action against a tenant due to a pet but hide it under some other reasoning. However, I think the fact that a no no-pets-clause exists means people are more open to having pets in their rental units. Maybe my experience was biased, but when we visited many rental places in Ontario, we noticed a lot more places that includes pets compared to California, where the leases all have restrictions for pets and pet sizes. There were even places that charge extra rent for pets.
Another clarification: in my above post, when trying to connect state/provincial laws with University housing, I was thinking of University-owned off-campus lease properties rather than on-campus housing. I don't know how it works everywhere, but I do know that some of the off-campus lease properties from my PhD school had policies that were driven by local/state laws. For example, there was an apartment complex that is meant for (and advertised as) family housing. However, state laws forbids landlords from using family status as a reason to rent to someone. So, there were students without families living there too. State laws did allow for setting a minimum and maximum number of tenants per bedroom (but not on the ages of tenants) so the most they could do is stipulate at least 1 person per bedroom. All of the units were 2 or more bedrooms, so you wouldn't have a single person renting a 2-bedroom there (at half the market rate) so it would mostly be couples/families or people who found roommates to share with.

You have higher odds of getting hit by a meteorite. Believe me, even if that passage was terribly obvious plagiarism, professors barely have time to read papers for the first time to correct them, much to less go back and read old papers.

I thought this question rang a bell and your memory is better than mine. Maybe if this is a recurring and long-term worry, OP should talk to someone about it...

You have higher odds of getting hit by a meteorite. Believe me, even if that passage was terribly obvious plagiarism, professors barely have time to read papers for the first time to correct them, much to less go back and read old papers.

Ok crisis averted! I emailed the prof last night telling him what happened and he emailed back this morning saying not to worry, that he's accidentally divulged too much in the past too, and that he'd just change the questions for everyone. So then I emailed the two students and said that it turns out that the questions I thought would be on there actually won't be but just to look back over notes for my lecture. I didn't get into the "why" of the whole situation with them though maybe I should have.
But thankfully, the prof wasn't mad and my conscience feels cleaner now that the questions are changed! I told him that the future, I'm going to work on being more tight lipped so that I don't give some students a better advantage than others. Thanks for weighing in, everyone! 

I can literally repeat questions from earlier exams on the final without seeing students pick up on it. 

I routinely tell my students "pay attention now, XXX will be on the exam". I only wish they'd listen. What I find a little off about this is that you didn't give all of your students the same shot at success. You let the two that you randomly ran into milk you for information. If you basically revealed exam questions to them, even if you didn't explicitly say "this is an exam question", that's going a step too far for me. Broadly saying "make sure you study X", though, is fine.

You have higher odds of getting hit by a meteorite. Believe me, even if that passage was terribly obvious plagiarism, professors barely have time to read papers for the first time to correct them, much to less go back and read old papers.

Seconded. The new system shifts the power from the applicant to the institutions. Instead of a feather in the applicant's cap, it's now just one more recruiting tool that universities can use to convince some candidate to come there instead of elsewhere. Frankly, I think it diminishes the prestige of the award. If university A gives you one of their allocated awards, why should that matter to university B? It's a positive signal, of course, but I don't know what criteria they used to judge, and I don't know who the other candidates are. Under the previous system it was prestigious because you knew that a recipient stacked up well in national competition against many other highly qualified applicants. 

1) Let's be clear here, the two schools you are deciding between are not top 25. PGSP has the Stanford named attached to it but do not let them deceive you into thinking you "are attending Stanford." With that being said PGSP has a much better track record in matching students to APA accredited internships. PGSP data Here, Pepperdine data Here
2) The general public has little knowledge of clinical program prestige so honestly the only thing that matters in private practice is your business sense. When it comes to training opportunities, yes reputation matters. From what I hear, PGSP has an okay reputation locally, nationally not so much. 
With that out of the way be realistic about life during and after attending these programs: Average completion time for the PGSP is between 5-6 years, with tuition at 48k that's 200k+ in debt without living expenses. You can do a quick search for bay area housing but in short- its very expensive. Average completion time for Pepperdine is between 5-6 years, with tuition at 60k that's 300k without living expenses. Keep in mind, this is not a lucrative field and California in general is saturated with psychologist. 
My best advice would be to get into a funded program, even partially funded would go a long way. The reality is many people pursuing a PhD go into clinical practice, do not be scared of research. Many funded PhD programs provide amazing clinical experience.

Reputation matters - of the advisor and program if you're interested in academia, of the institution if you're interested in industry. People here talk about "research fit" or "productivity" and "prestige" as if they're independent dimensions but they're often not. 
Interesting twitter thread relevant to this from about a month ago.
Some quotes: 
- "The fact is that an astonishingly small number of elite universities produce an overwhelming number of America’s professors. One study found: "just a quarter of all universities account for 71-86% of all tenure-track faculty in the U.S. and Canada"
- "The most ‘‘efficient’’ program in the US placed about 1 of 5 admitted students into PhD training positions (essentially research intensive faculty jobs)[though this data does not track positions obtained outside the USA]."
- "There is a lot of variance *between* schools...But no one talks about the variance *within* schools. My guess is that a small number of labs/mentors at the top programs place most of the students. At places I've been this is often obvious to faculty, but not to students. "

Reputation matters - of the advisor and program if you're interested in academia, of the institution if you're interested in industry. People here talk about "research fit" or "productivity" and "prestige" as if they're independent dimensions but they're often not. 
Interesting twitter thread relevant to this from about a month ago.
Some quotes: 
- "The fact is that an astonishingly small number of elite universities produce an overwhelming number of America’s professors. One study found: "just a quarter of all universities account for 71-86% of all tenure-track faculty in the U.S. and Canada"
- "The most ‘‘efficient’’ program in the US placed about 1 of 5 admitted students into PhD training positions (essentially research intensive faculty jobs)[though this data does not track positions obtained outside the USA]."
- "There is a lot of variance *between* schools...But no one talks about the variance *within* schools. My guess is that a small number of labs/mentors at the top programs place most of the students. At places I've been this is often obvious to faculty, but not to students. "

I think it's important to take a step back and analyze what's happening a little more carefully! 
It does not sound like what is happening is actually in violation of the resolution. The resolution says that the student cannot be forced to respond to a financial offer before April 15. But it does not cover things like position in a lab, or a specific assignment or anything like that. As long as the program will still extend the financial offer to the student until April 15, the resolution is upheld.
(I wrote the above while this reply came in).
Anyways, I don't think the professor is doing anything wrong by asking a potential student to commit to their lab prior to April 15. The prof probably has a lot of people interested and they want to get the best student for their lab. Similarly, some programs have profs accept students into their lab way later (e.g. end of first year). What I mean to say here is that there's no convention or protocol that suggests prospective or current students should have the right to decide whatever lab they want to join at any time. Instead, it is normal in most fields for the program or the professor to dictate the decision timeline for joining research groups. It's very possible for students to be accepted into programs but not into any lab (or not into any lab they are interested in) which basically means the student has to change research interests or go elsewhere.
As for useful advice to this situation: I would not take the above advice to not work with someone because they want you to commit to their lab at this point. Again, this is a fair thing for professors to require because they are also committing resources and time to you. So, the first thing to do is to compare this particular lab with the program/lab you're waitlisted for. If, after comparison with the hypothetical offer, you still think this offer in hand is more desirable, then just accept it. Withdraw from the other offer.
Meanwhile, ask the other school for an update on your waitlist status (unless you have already asked very recently). Ask the question today, before end of business day. It might take them a day or two to get back to you, so ask first, then think about the hypothetical offer vs. real offer you have in hand. In your request/ask, you should be clear and say that you have another offer to work with a prof that requires you to commit to their lab ASAP and you would like to know 1) if they have a timeline on when they would make offers from the waitlist and 2) if they have any information on the likelihood of you getting an offer. Hopefully you will get an honest response, and it might be that "you're low on the waitlist and unlikely to get an answer before April 15" which may not be the answer you want but at least it makes the decision easier.
Going back to the decision of offer-in-hand vs. potential-offer-from-waitlist, if you decide that you might want the waitlisted offer more, then have a frank and honest discussion with the POI about your priorities and desires. Keep in mind that this conversation might result in you losing the place in his lab, but if you do nothing, you will lose the place in his lab anyways. The goal is to see if he would be willing to hold your place for a little bit longer (hopefully by now, you've heard from waitlisted school and know how long it might take to hear back from them). 
Having to choose between offers in hand and potential other offers out there is a fact of life and will be a tough choice you have to make at all future stages of your career, whether it's in academia or outside of academia. And try to see it from the other side: The POI is having the exact same student-in-hand vs other-potential-student dilemma. The POI is definitely very interested in having you join his lab (of course, otherwise why would he make the offer). However, the longer you wait, the less likely he is able to get another similarly good student if you say no. So, when you are asking for an extension, he has to decide whether to grant it to you and risk losing both you and the next student on his list, or he can potentially move onto the second student and get them to commit for sure (maybe the second student has already told him that he/she will commit if an offer is made).
Ultimately, remember that you are not the only one trying to find the optimal matchup. If you think you are a strong enough candidate that the POI will wait for you instead of falling onto their "backup" student, then asking for an extension is a good idea. But first try to determine if the waitlisted offer is worth the risk (e.g. if the waitlisted school says they don't expect waitlist offers to be made until on or after April 15, then that seems highly risky!). If so, then you might as well ask for an extension since the worse case of that is the prof saying no and rescinding the offer to join his lab, which is what would happen anyways if you wait too long.
Finally, because the POI said "respond ASAP" rather than "respond by [date]", it indicates to me that he might be willing to be a little flexible for now. It might be worth discussing with him how long he is willing to hold your spot in his lab. It might be that there is one spot and two students interested and he's going to say yes to the first student that responds. If this is the case, then it sounds very unlikely that he'll grant an extension and this would be very good information to know since it might inform how you want to proceed.

Prestige and ranking matter. However, it's important to keep in mind that there's the university's overall ranking, the departmental ranking, and the ranking of your subfield within the department, which could differ widely. Inside of academia, people in your field will be familiar with the top programs in your field, even if those aren't the top overall psychology programs. Outside of academia, brand name tends to matter most.

Sometimes it's the things you mention. But it's possible that aspects of your underlying assumption (quoted) are wrong. The people who have applied 3+ times and are still unsuccessful might not have the aptitude for graduate studies--or are consistently aiming higher than their aptitude would allow. Sometimes there are factors that more RA experience just won't fix, like hitting a ceiling on GRE scores, having an undergraduate degree from a middling institution, or unknowingly resubmitting unremarkable reference letters (in content or source). Not everybody is cut out for graduate school (or medical school, or dating a supermodel, etc.).
ETA: I am curious why it's scary that not everybody can get what they want, career wise. I absolutely understand why it might be personally uncomfortable to think that one can't have one's dream, but why in the more general sense that "people" won't be able to do it?
 

No one can tell you how your parents will respond, as that's entirely dependant on their personalities. Based on your mother's comment of the world doesn't need anymore psychologists, she may not understand the extent of what psychologists can do. You just have to come out and tell them. They'll figure it out soon enough when you start applying for programs. My advice would be to just outline to them exactly what you wrote in this post:  OT doesn't excite you, you've been working in a psych research lab, and you want to switch trajectories. After all, that's part of what undergrad is all about. 

Saying there are no safety schools is accurate in the sense that acceptance rates are low regardless of program ranking.
But I'd be concerned if anybody came to the conclusion that all programs are equally difficult to get into, or that it's not important to attend a top 10 program or the best program you can. I can't speak for clinical paths, but for academia it's important to get into the highest prestige program that you can because academia is "downwardly mobile" and "a caste system" and "steeply hierarchical" where much of the faculty hiring comes from a small core of top programs. Put another way, on average, you're much more likely to move down than up in the BA-MA-PhD-Postdoc-Job progression--the study I linked found that only 9-14% of students will get job placements higher-ranked than their PhD institution, and that about 25% of institutions produce ~80% of the tenured faculty.
 
 

Sometimes it's the things you mention. But it's possible that aspects of your underlying assumption (quoted) are wrong. The people who have applied 3+ times and are still unsuccessful might not have the aptitude for graduate studies--or are consistently aiming higher than their aptitude would allow. Sometimes there are factors that more RA experience just won't fix, like hitting a ceiling on GRE scores, having an undergraduate degree from a middling institution, or unknowingly resubmitting unremarkable reference letters (in content or source). Not everybody is cut out for graduate school (or medical school, or dating a supermodel, etc.).
ETA: I am curious why it's scary that not everybody can get what they want, career wise. I absolutely understand why it might be personally uncomfortable to think that one can't have one's dream, but why in the more general sense that "people" won't be able to do it?